


i'm the one i should love in this world

by GeneratorCat



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Dom/sub Undertones, Hopeful Ending, JayJay Challenge, M/M, Praise Kink, Slight Choking, Slightly Open-Ended, ewww tim likes nickleback, he also gets a dog, i meant it to just be jay/jay but apparently i'm incapable of not writing jaytim, jason gets self-loving and not just in a smutty way, jason had lots of feelings he doesn't know what to do with, le sexy times, not about tim liking nickleback just in general, some edging, the jaytim is kind of... background/past/pre, tim is not involved in le sexy times, universe hopping, who woulda guessed, yes the sex is between jason and other jason
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-30 00:00:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20087416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GeneratorCat/pseuds/GeneratorCat
Summary: Other Jason lifts his head, opens his eyes. He glances around the living room, as if the oriental rug and open floor plan is what’s interesting here and not Jason. As if Jason isn’t a threat, even after tying the man up, even sitting a few feet away with a loaded gun pointed casually at his balls. The man is looking for something, he realises, and he thinks he didn’t find it when he eventually focuses on him. They watch each other for a long moment like two wary dogs meeting in an alley.“Time travel?” Jason guesses, finally breaking the silence. The man, who is almost his exact physical copy, looks to be the same age, but he could be from a couple years from now, or hell, even a couple weeks.“Alternate dimension,” he answers after a small pause. “Where’s Tim?”





	i'm the one i should love in this world

**Author's Note:**

> title from bts’ epiphany because i am literally incapable of bypassing that opportunity and also it’s perfect  
([mv](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIkZOLsnoqY) and [lyric video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mc9r_BrkLmg) of full song. stream epiphany)  
beta'd by the awesome [chibi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chibi_nightowl) <3
> 
> “If someone does not want me it is not the end of the world. But if I do not want me the world is nothing but endings.”  
— Nayyirah Waheed

There’s a crack and a boom and the world is splitting itself apart, a flash of brilliant light and then a hole is ripping open in the reality of space and time. Right in the middle of Jason’s bedroom. 

He has a gun ready and pointed at the anomaly before the light has a chance to fade and he watches from the bathroom doorway, toothbrush hanging from his foamy lips, as a hand shoots through the gap, then another, and they grab the sides and push the hole wider. Then out of the darkness, surrounded by smoke, comes a head and shoulders and a body, shoving itself through with what looks like a lot of effort. The person lands with a thud on his rug, panting heavily. The hole zips back up and, with a final burst of light, it’s gone. 

It’s silent but for the labored breathing of the person on the floor. 

Jason wants to spit out the toothpaste in his mouth. 

He waits, finger on the trigger.

A short minute later the person grunts, pushing themselves onto their knees and grabbing the mattress for support as they climb shakily to their feet. They glance around the room and then their eyes land on Jason, still standing there in his Supergirl boxers. 

“Oh god  _ dammit _ ,” the person sighs, and then they list to the side and collapse onto Jason’s bed, out cold. 

Jason waits a beat, and then, uncocking the gun, turns back to the bathroom sink and rinses his mouth. He comes out into the bedroom and looks down at the man lying on his previously neat and clean sheets, at his face. His very familiar face. 

There are subtle differences, but no doubt– he’s looking down at  _ himself _ . 

“Well.” He braces his hands on his hips, arms akimbo. Pops his minty-fresh lips. “This is a new one.”

~

He knows when the man– the other Jason– wakes up, even though he doesn’t move, doesn’t even twitch. He knows the other Jason is feeling the chair he’s sitting on and the ropes around his arms and legs, is listening carefully to the room. Jason shifts on the couch, the tiny sound of it letting the other man know he’s there and he knows he’s awake. 

Other Jason lifts his head, opens his eyes. He glances around the living room, as if the oriental rug and open floor plan is what’s interesting here and not Jason. As if Jason isn’t a threat, even after tying the man up, even sitting a few feet away with a loaded gun pointed casually at his balls. The man is looking for something, he realises, and he thinks he didn’t find it when he eventually focuses on him. They watch each other for a long moment like two wary dogs meeting in an alley. 

“Time travel?” Jason guesses, finally breaking the silence. The man, who is almost his exact physical copy, looks to be the same age, but he could be from a couple years from now, or hell, even a couple weeks. 

“Alternate dimension,” he answers after a small pause. “Where’s Tim?”

He doesn’t bother hiding his frown. “The replacement? I don’t know,” he lies, knowing exactly where Tim is. He keeps trackers on that little fucker, just like the ones the little fucker keeps on him. It’s almost like a game at this point, who can hide them better, who can find them faster, who can plant them on a truck headed for Vermont and send the other on a wild goose chase. He’s not sure what the point of the game is, but it feels dangerously like attention, like care. It’s also the most interaction he has with anyone in the family. That, and last month when Tim sent over some info on the drug lord Jason was hunting. He’s been meaning to return the favor. 

“He’s not… he doesn’t live here?”

“Why the hell would he live here?”

Other Jason goes very tense, afraid in the way Jason had expected from the beginning. His attention zeros in fully on the real danger here: Jason, and his gun. He doesn’t answer.

Reaching over to the coffee table with his free hand, Jason plucks an old Walkman CD player from the assortment of items (a knife, blue electrical tape, tweezers, a pair of headphones, and a half-eaten bag of candy corn) he’d stripped off Other Jason. He’d been clutching it when he climbed through the portal. Inside is a disk, Nickleback’s  _ Curb _ album. 

He looks up. 

Other Jason just sighs, longsuffering. 

He pops the disk out and underneath there’s a lot of fried wires and a shattered circuit board. “This the thing that brought you here?” 

He inspects the device. It looks too simple for something that can take a person to another dimension– if that is really what’s happening here. This could all be a trick. Hell, this could all be a dream. He’s had weirder. 

Instead of answering, Other Jason asks, “You gonna do something with that gun or are you just trying to scare me?” 

Lowering the muzzle angle a few degrees, he fires off a shot. It goes through the seat of the chair, an inch from the man’s lap. 

For some reason, that makes Other Jason relax. He raises an unimpressed eyebrow. “Now you’re gonna have to fix the hole in your floor and replace the carpet. Good job.” 

“The fuck is wrong with you?” Jason asks. 

“If you were a version of me that I should be afraid of, you would’ve shot me in the leg. Or the dick.” Jason’s hand twitches, wanting to do just that. As if reading his mind, Other Jason says, “Don’t be petty.” 

And god, that just compounds Jason’s spite. But it works. He sets down the gun on the sofa cushion. “How many versions of you have you met?”

“Only a few. Been to a lot of universes but I don’t always meet me.” 

“Bad aim?” Jason guesses wryly, holding up the Walkman again. 

“I have perfect aim,” the other him snaps. “I’m just not shooting for me.” 

“Who are you shooting for?” When he doesn’t answer, Jason looks down at the damaged device. He thinks about the man’s first question. “It’s supposed to take you to Tim.”

Bizarrely, that stings. Here’s a Jason Todd that has the power to travel to alternate dimensions, and he uses it not to find himself, but Tim. 

Even Jason doesn’t want Jason.

“Why are you looking for Tim?”

There’s a moment before Other Jason answers, like he’s rolling the words in his mouth, trying to force them out. “Because mine died.”

There was a time when hearing that Tim Drake had died would have made him happy, or at the least, apathetic. He doesn’t feel that way now, and it’s a relief. He doesn’t want to be the person he was when he wanted Tim dead. 

“Why do you care so much?” he asks, because this man has jumped to an entirely different reality just for Tim Drake, and even though he doesn’t want the kid dead anymore, he doesn’t understand going through this much trouble. “Why  _ him _ ?”

“Because he was  _ mine _ .”

Jason freezes. “Yours,” he echoes, and bites back a laugh. That there’s a world out there where Jason has somebody, and that somebody is Tim… That’s the craziest part about all of this so far. “So, what, you came looking for another one? You want–” he stops himself from saying ‘mine’. “You want the one in this ‘verse?” He snorts, imagining what would happen if Jason– any Jason– went up to Tim Drake and professed his love. “Good luck.” 

“I’m not gonna try to take him away,” he says, like he thinks Tim is some toy Jason doesn’t want to share. “I just… It doesn’t matter. But I do need his help now.” He jerks his chin at the thing in Jason’s hands. “As you can see, it’s all kinds of fucked. Had some trouble with my last jump, barely made it here in one piece. Tim can fix it.”

“You can’t?” Jason asks. “Not very bright to use equipment you don’t know how to maintain.” 

“It would take me too long. I’m on a time limit here.” 

“How long do you have?”

“Three days.” 

“What happens if you’re here longer than three days?” 

“The universe knows there’s something here that’s not supposed to be, and it’ll try and get rid of it. Problem is: it’s not too great at picking out the wrong thing– me. Lots of stuff could go haywire before it figures it out. And there’s no guarantee it’ll be able to distinguish me from you.”

“And Tim can fix it.” 

“Yes. He built it.” 

Jason rubs a hand over his mouth and jaw. This whole situation is ridiculous, but... But he can see the truth, the desperation, in this man’s eyes. In his own eyes. “Alright.” He stands up, taking the device with him as he heads for the door. “You just wait here.” 

“Wait, what– hey! Where are you going?” Other Jason demands. 

“To get Tim.” 

~

When he comes back home two hours later with wet hair from bad weather and Tim tossed over his shoulder in a fireman carry, he’s not surprised to find Other Jason is unbound. Neither is he very surprised to find him cleaning the kitchen. 

“What the hell did you do?” the man hisses upon seeing Tim’s limp form. 

“He’s not hurt,” Jason says, laying him down on the couch. “Mildly sedated.”

Mumbling softly, Tim swipes a floppy hand out, slapping Jason’s thigh with little force. Then he rolls over and starts snoring. 

Other Jason scowls hard. “This is the sort of shit that makes it hard for him to trust you!” he says, pointing at Tim with a yellow rubber-gloved finger. 

“You needed Tim so I got him,” Jason grinds out. “Why should I care if he trusts me?”

“Don’t even try that with me. You fucking care. You care about him and Dick and Bruce and all of them, and if you don’t stop doing stuff like this it’ll never get better with them.”

He’s right. He’s  _ right _ . But Jason can barely admit that to himself and he doesn’t want to hear it out loud– even from… himself. “You might be me from another world, but that doesn’t mean you know everything about me in  _ this _ world.”

“While you were gone I hacked into B’s system and checked out his files. I saw enough to know that this world is almost exactly like my own. You’re me, but for one difference; something happened in my world that allowed me to be amicable with the family. That didn’t happen here. But I know you want it to. I know how much I wanted it, before it happened. We’re the same.”

“Oh yeah?” Jason snaps. “How are we the same? Is it that we’re assholes? Pissed the fuck off?” 

“We just want to be loved!” the other Jason yells. “We want a family. We want to be accepted and understood. We want to be loved. I had that.” His eyes gravitate towards sleeping Tim, and he looks devastated. “I had all of that and I lost it. Don’t… don’t be too proud to let yourself have it.” 

Jason  _ burns _ with fury, with embarrassment, with jealousy, with the smallest ray of hope that just makes him ever angrier. “I don’t know what magic you pulled in your universe, but in this one, I can’t have that. In this universe, they hate who I am. That ain’t changing, and it ain’t because of my  _ pride _ .”

Other Jason shakes his head, frustrated, and kneels down to inspect Tim. He pulls off the yellow glove and checks his temperature, checks his eyes, checks his breathing. And then he just cradles Tim’s head in his hands and strokes his hair. 

Jason turns away, feeling like he’s seeing something not meant for him. 

~

It takes another forty minutes for Tim to come around, and when he does, he wakes up swinging. 

Other Jason, who’d been sitting on the floor next to him, rolls out of the way and holds up his hands. “Ba– Tim, it’s okay! It’s okay, I’m not gonna hurt you.” 

“The fuck is…” Tim slurs, still disoriented. Facing Other Jason, he hasn’t noticed Jason leaning on the kitchen island behind the couch. There’s a long moment where he collects himself, breathing deeply and watching Other Jason for any wrong move. The only sound is the pattering of rain hitting the windows. 

“You’re not Jason,” he says.

Other Jason raises an eyebrow, amused and proud. “How do you know?”

“You don’t have the scar on your temple. Haircut is different. You’re putting too much weight on your left leg– his left knee hurts when it rains. And you’re…” Slowly, Tim shifts, readying for an attack that he doesn’t know won’t come. “He doesn’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” Other Jason asks softly. 

With openness and want, Jason thinks, and he doesn’t want to hear it said out loud. He’s about to speak up when Tim demands, “Where is he?”

“Right here.” 

Tim whirls around, glances at him, and then practically flies off the couch, stumbling slightly and edging toward the nearest exit. “Who are you?” he asks of Other Jason. “What’s going on here?” 

“You can… you can call me Todd. And what’s going on is that I need your help.” He–  _ Todd _ – explains the situation, and Tim’s eyes light up with the fire of curiosity with each word. By the end, he’s relaxed some. Still on guard, but listening. He turns to Jason. 

“Why did you  _ kidnap _ me? You could have just asked me to come over!”

“I didn’t think you’d believe me.” He honestly didn’t think Tim would willingly enter his home. 

Tim rolls his eyes so hard it must hurt. “There’s, like, a thousand better ways you could have handled this!”

“He’s right,” Todd says. 

Jason scowls. “Fine, it was an impulse decision, it happened, can we get past it now?”

“Unbelievable,” Tim mutters, shoving his hands inside his oversized hoodie. “Okay, come on, show me this thing only I can fix. Let’s make this quick, I was working on something,” he says pointedly. “Saving penguins or the world or some shit. The world from The Penguin, maybe.” 

Jason hands over the CD player.

“Nickelback,” Tim says. “Nice.” 

~

Tim tells Jason to show him to his work room.

“I don’t have a work room,” Jason tells him. 

Tim puts a hand on his hip. “Grow up. You’re the one that needs the help in the first place and also fucking  _ kidnapped _ me, so the least you can do is provide an adequate space and tools to do what needs to be done.”

Jason takes him downstairs to the garage.  _ Not _ a work room. (Though it is, admittedly, where he does all of his work.)

Todd follows shortly after with a tray loaded with snacks and coffee. Tim  _ ooh _ s appreciatively, then tells them both to get the hell out. 

~

“So how does a universe vacation for you usually go?” Jason asks, mixing together a salad. He’s very pointedly making a single serving. “When your tech doesn’t break. Just swoop in, fuck around with Tim, then move on to the next?”

Grabbing a bowl from the cupboard, Todd comes up beside him at the counter and starts in on his own salad, chopping vegetables. His arm almost brushes Jason’s; he’s close enough to feel the heat from his body. “Sometimes I talk to him. Other times, I just watch.”

“Wow. You’re totally whipped for him, aren’t you? Kid must have a fantastic cock.”

He said it expecting to goad Todd, but instead the man just grins. “I am and he does. You should try it.” 

“No thanks, I’m fine with my own.” Jason tries to ignore the curious part of his brain that’s imagining what Tim’s fantastic cock is like. He doesn’t need Tim’s cock. He has hands and toys and those are good enough. They don’t say anything, they don’t presume anything, and they do exactly what he wants because the only way to get what he wants is to do it himself. With someone else, he would have to  _ talk _ , he would have to say  _ out loud _ the things he wants, and have the other person hear it and know it and know him. 

Glancing over, he wonders if Todd already knows these things, if he’s the same in this way as well. Todd probably knows exactly how Jason wishes to be touched. 

Face burning, Jason quickly turns away and takes his salad over to the island, sitting on a bar stool. A minute later, Todd slides onto the next stool and they eat quietly, but for the crunch of lettuce and carrots. 

“You don’t have to fall in love with Tim,” Todd says, chasing a cherry tomato around with his fork. “It doesn’t happen in every world, and even if it did, you’re free to make that choice for yourself. You just need to know that something like that is an option, yeah? Things that happened… they don’t need to define who you are now and how you live. You don’t have to isolate yourself.” 

“Haven’t you isolated yourself?” Jason counters. “You spend all your time chasing after someone who’s gone. Do you even go back to your own ‘verse any more?” 

The muscles in Todd’s shoulder flex. He eats the tomato. “I guess we both have trouble moving on from the past.” 

Jason can’t really argue with that.

~

Todd takes food and coffee down to Tim every couple hours. He doesn’t stay long, probably because Tim doesn’t want to be bothered. 

~

He’s not sure why he asks it. Maybe he wants to feel better about himself, wants to be able to point at something and say,  _ at least I’m not that. At least I’ve done better than that. _ “How many versions of us are bad?”

Todd pauses, then continues sharpening his knife with careful strokes. “Depends on your definition of bad, really.”

Jason hums, considering. “We do have a pretty loose one. Is there… is there a world where I killed Bruce?” 

Todd sets down the knife, and the room stays silent for a long time. 

~

Just after midnight, Todd storms into the apartment carrying an armful of empty mugs and deposits them in the sink. “Stupid fucking kid thinks he can just stay up for days on end,” he mutters. Then, louder, “I tried to get him to come here and sleep, but he refused.”

Jason shrugs. “He’s got work to do.”

“He’s  _ always _ got work to do!” Todd yells, throwing his hands up in the air. “There’s always something. One day he’s gonna burn himself out and make a mistake.” 

The weight behind that, the way his fists clench tight, and the rage and sadness in his eyes, make it clear he’s speaking from experience. 

Todd turns around and points at Jason. “You need to watch out for him, okay? He doesn’t do what’s best for himself. He needs to be monitored.” 

He frowns, incredulous. “What in the hell gives me the right to tell someone else what’s best for them? Besides, he’s not a child, and I’m not his mother.”

“No, but you can be his friend.” 

“He doesn’t want me to be his friend!”

“He does!” Todd insists, moving closer. “He does, I promise. He respects you, he always has. You just need to–”

“Change everything about myself? Go back in time and stop myself from trying to kill him?” 

“Doesn’t the fact that he’s here, helping us, tell you something? He wants to be close with you, to be able to trust you. You just have to let it happen.” 

Jason physically recoils, both at that idea and the fact that Todd has moved into his personal space, one hand reaching out like he’s going to grab hold. “You’ve been here for one day and you think you have me and him and everything figured out. You can’t  _ know _ –”

“I know you,” he cuts in firmly. “Maybe this world isn’t exactly the same as mine, but I know myself and I know you, and I know that you’re punishing yourself by keeping everyone out. You think you don’t deserve to be loved or to feel good. You think you ruin everything you touch. I won’t stand here and say you’re perfect, or that I’m perfect, but self-depreciation gets old. The world is already trying to cut you down, why should you help it? You’re not the monster you’ve been painted as, and you have the potential to heal and be so much better.” Slowly, Todd rests a hand on Jason’s shoulder. “You’ve already started, I can see it. You’re better off than you were before, right? So keep healing. And part of that is letting people in. It doesn’t even have to be Tim. Dick, or Alfred, or Barbara.  _ Someone. _ ”

Jason stares at the floor to avoid the painful earnestness on his face. “I’ve been thinking… about getting a dog,” he admits. 

With a small squeeze, Todd says, “That’s great. That’s really great.” He slides his hand up to the back of Jason’s neck and rubs perfect little circles, and Jason melts into the touch for a moment. 

Then he steps back, heart pounding. “You can sleep on the couch. I’m going to bed.”

~

Jason wakes to the smell of eggs and toast and coffee, the clinking of dishes, and the low murmur of voices. It’s a strange feeling, having people in his home. He can almost pretend they’re people who want to be there. 

He showers and dresses, then walks out of his bedroom to find Todd and Tim in comfortable conversation over empty plates. He feels something like longing at the sight and starts to push it down but then stops, and lets himself feel it. He could be that Jason Todd sitting at the table, talking to Tim, enjoying morning sunlight and company. He hates how much he wants that. 

Tim notices him in the doorway, and his smile falters. “Hey.” 

“Um. Hey,” he replies awkwardly. 

Tapping a beat out on the edge of the table with his index fingers, Tim says, “Okay, well I’m gonna go back downstairs and finish this thing up.”

“Oh, you’re almost done?” Jason asks, disappointment flooding his belly. 

Heading for the front door, he answers, “Yeah, it should be ready to rock and roll in a few hours.” Tim throws a lazy wave over his shoulder as the door clicks shut. 

“This doesn’t have to be the last time you see him,” Todd says, snatching Jason’s attention. 

“I don’t know what–” Jason swallows, frustrated and embarrassed, but makes himself finish. “I don’t know how to make that happen. I won’t have another universe-hopping Walkman for him to fix.”

“He’s not here for the Walkman,” Todd says. Jason gives him a look. “Okay, yeah, he is. But he’s also here for you.”

~

Todd comes to sit next to Jason on the sofa. Jason closes his book. 

“I did seek myself out,” Todd starts, “the first few worlds I jumped to. But it got… hard. One time, I saw a version of me that didn’t die. Another, I never realised who I was after coming out of the pit, and I stayed with Ra’s. This one world, I was just some guy– a drummer playing gigs at bars and weddings. Some were better than my own reality and some were worse, but they all hurt. It hurts to see what could have been if you’d made better choices, or if someone in your life had just been paying more attention. It hurts to see the potential in yourself to do terrible things. It hurts to go to a universe where hardly anything is changed, and see how you were not too long ago, and he’s in so much pain, and it just reminds you of that going through that yourself. 

“So eventually I stopped looking for the other me’s. I didn’t want to be reminded. But…” he looks at Jason intently. “Maybe I needed to be reminded.” 

~

Jason is scrolling through a doggie adoption website when Tim comes barging into the apartment with a bang. He slams the laptop shut. 

“I did it, bitches!” Tim crows, holding the CD player high. “Wait, where’s Todd?”

“He went out for pizza.”

“Oh. Then– I did it, bitch!” With a heavy sigh, he drops onto the opposite end of the couch from Jason and places the device between them. He looks exhausted. “Marvel, mortal, at my brilliance.” 

“I think if one of us is the mortal here, it’s you,” Jason says, opening it up to find a beautiful piece of tech. He thinks he could figure it out, given some time, but Tim’s work really is impressive. 

Tim waves a dismissive hand. “Resurrected doesn’t mean immortal. You can still die again.”

Jason stares at him. “Why are you still here?” At Tim’s frown he adds, “I mean, I just thought you’d book it the second you finished.”

“Gotta say bye to Todd. And, like, there’s gonna be pizza, so.”

Jason wonders if he can use to pizza to lure Tim over again sometime. “You work quick,” he says instead. 

Dramatically, Tim gasps. “A compliment!” Jason rolls his eyes. “Yeah, a few hours ahead of what I thought it’d take, even with the modification Todd asked me to put in.”

“What mod?”

“He had me program it for one more use only. It’ll destruct after he jumps home. Like, beyond repair destruct.”

“Oh.” Jason turns the Walkman over in his hands. He feels… something. The implication of Todd’s decision resonates within him, and he’s not sure what to make of that. It plucks a chord inside him, but he doesn’t know what the music is supposed to sound like.

They watch TV in awkward silence until Todd gets back bearing a half dozen pizza boxes and a bag of powdered donut holes. He sets aside two boxes on the coffee table and then presents the rest to Tim, whose eyes light up. 

“All for me?” Flipping open the top lid, he cheers. “Aw hell yeah! Artichoke!” 

“You did good, baby,” Todd says, and maybe Tim is too entranced by the food to notice the endearment, or maybe he just doesn’t care, because it goes unmentioned. Pointing to the other two boxes, Todd tells Jason, “Those are for us.” 

He already knows what’s inside, without having to check. 

Todd sits on the floor on the other side of the coffee table and slides one box toward himself. Pulls out a slice of barbeque with pickles. 

Jason watches him for a moment, and then starts in on his own identical pizza. “I guess you do know what I want.”

“Yeah.” Todd meets his stare evenly. “I do.” 

~

“Thanks for the fun, fellas,” Tim says, patting his full belly and standing up with a groan. “I gotta get home before I pass out.” 

Todd rises too, fingers twitching like he’s stopping himself from reaching out. Tim hesitates, and then moves forward and lets him wrap him up in a white-knuckled hug. 

“Goodbye,” Todd says, and it’s so heavy and sad he might be saying goodbye to this Tim and his Tim and every Tim. He is, Jason realises. He has one jump left and he’s going home. 

Jason feels like he’s intruding, again. 

“Good luck,” Tim says when he finally steps away. He turns and points at Jason accusingly. “You kidnap me one more time and I’m gonna start taking it personal. Seriously. Just call.” 

Jason jerks his head in acknowledgement, wondering what it would feel like to  _ just call _ him over. 

When Tim walks out the door for the final time, carrying his prize of leftover pizza and donuts, Todd looks like his heart is breaking all over again. 

~

Like with Tim, Jason expects Todd to leave as soon as possible.

He doesn’t. 

“Don’t you want to get home?” Jason asks. 

“I’ve got a few hours,” Todd replies, glancing at the clock on the wall. “Thought I’d spend them with you, if you don’t mind.” 

“Why?”

“I want to. And I think you want me to.” 

Jason doesn’t deny it. He picks at a hole in his jeans, then clears his throat. “What you said before, about letting someone close…” 

“It’s not gonna fix all your problems, or magically make you better,” Todd says, resting one arm on the back of the sofa and touching the wisps of hair on Jason’s neck. “But it helps. Having people around, talking, and touching, and caring… it helps. It can be easy, when you're alone, to forget you're a person.” 

“Maybe you  _ want _ to forget you're a person.”

“Sometimes,” he agrees. “Do you?”

Slowly, Jason shakes his head. “Not anymore. Not right now.” 

“You want to feel,” Todd says, somewhere between a question and a statement. “You want to be taken care of.” 

Jason nods, grateful that he doesn’t need to voice it himself. 

When Todd shifts sideways, leaning against the arm of the couch and opening his legs, Jason moves to sit between them, his back to Todd’s chest. Arms come to wrap around his middle, and he can’t remember the last time he was held like this. 

“You know sex isn’t therapy, right? It won’t make you better,” Todd repeats, voice low and warm in his ear. 

“I know, I know. It’s just. It might make it easier for me to… be with someone else. And I just–” He runs his fingertips over the back of Todd’s hands. “I want to feel good. I just want to feel good for once.”

“Yeah,” Todd says softly. “Me too.” 

~

Todd sits on the foot of the bed, feet planted on the floor, hands on his bare thighs. All of his clothes are neatly folded and stacked on top of the dresser. Jason’s own clothes are in a pile on the floor because he’s too nervous to care right now– everything except for his boxers, which he pushes down after one last fortifying breath. Being naked in front of another person is strange and terrifying, but it helps that the other person’s nakedness is the same as his own. He meets Todd’s eyes, and he gives him a small nod.

Todd stays still as Jason to lies down across his lap, at the edge of the mattress, feet hanging off the far side because even a king is not wide enough for a man his size to lie sideways comfortably. He feels silly, like he’s about to get a spanking. Embarrassment and excitement burning through him, he hides his face in the blanket. Not being able to see what Todd is doing makes him squirm in anticipation. Just this, the expectation, is getting him flushed and he’s not hard yet, but is starting to be. 

The first tough is gentle. Fingertips between his shoulder blades, sliding up and down, coaxing him to relax. Todd massages his back with one hand and scratches his head with the other, and Jason melts, feels like he’d be purring if he were a cat. Then the hand on his back moves over his neck and slowly clamps down, reaching almost all the way around, grip firm but not tight enough to block any air flow, and Jason’s breath leaves him in a low whimper, cock twitching. His hair is still being played with, caring and sweet. 

“You good?” Todd asks. They talked before, and Todd made him  _ promise _ to say if he was uncomfortable with anything. Made him promise to not just take what was given, because this is supposed to be the time when Jason gets exactly what he wants. 

“Yes,” Jason whispers. Swallows. “Yes.”

Todd squeezes slightly, and then moves his touch down, lower and lower, rubbing the stress away from Jason’s muscles in his back and then his hips and ass and legs. He takes his time, touches teasing on the inside of his thighs, index finger brushing so close to Jason’s balls. 

Just when Jason is ready to say something, to ask for it, to beg, there’s the click of a bottle being opened and then the fingers are back, slick, with purpose, sliding between his cheeks, spreading lube everywhere. Jason’s hips tilt up, his legs shift wider apart, and he lets out a small, needy noise. He groans as Todd rubs over his hole, gasps as he presses inside, cries out when a hand tangles back into his hair and pins his face down to the bed. Todd works him open slowly, steadily, with one finger and then two and three, and Jason’s moans are muffled by the blanket but they’re still the loudest thing in the room, louder than the wet sounds of the fingers thrusting into his body. Todd pauses to squirt more lube into his hole, and Jason whines, feeling a rush of arousal at being so messy and soaking wet. 

Voice low and rough, Todd asks, “You ready?” 

“ _ Yes _ ,” Jason answers, pushing himself up on trembling arms. Todd scoots back to sit against the headboard and Jason straddles him, staying up on his knees so Todd has room to put on the condom. He closes his eyes, feeling the way his hole gapes and clenches, the way the lube is cool on his skin, the way his heart pounds, the way his cock hangs heavy between his legs. Then Todd is guiding him forward and down over his ready cock. Jason doesn’t give him a chance to ask if he’s ready, if he really wants this; he sinks down.

He’s so wet and stretched that he doesn’t have to wait, is able to lower himself all the way down in one slow glide. 

“Fuck,” Todd hisses, grabbing his hips. 

Throwing his head back, Jason stares up at the ceiling. For a long minute he just stays right there, enjoying being so full. Then Todd shifts under him, making him gasp and brace himself on his shoulders. Jason grinds down, and then rises up. Todd holds him in place and fucks up into him. 

“Oh god,” Jason groans, gaze falling down to Todd splayed out beneath him. “Yeah, that’s– that’s g-good,” he stutters through another thrust. 

Making a noise like he’s been punched, Todd grips him hard and pulls him down to meet his hips on the way up, eyes desperate, and Jason knows exactly what he’s looking for. He licks his lips. 

“It’s good,” he tells him, panting hard. “You’re doing so good.” 

Todd moans, loud and broken and needy. He fucks up into him, holding his body in just the right place until Jason’s knees are aching and he can’t help but make these stupid little  _ ah ah ah _ sounds, and it’s good, it’s so good, but he wants something else. So he says, “Wait,” and Todd stills. 

“I want…” he mumbles, struggling to voice it. He slides off of Todd’s lap and grabs the pillows, stacks them, and then lies down with them under his hips so his ass is propped up and open. The feeling of being exposed, thinking about what he must look like right now, all used and red and dripping wet… He rolls his hips down, rubbing his so-far untouched cock against the pillows. 

Behind him, Todd moves into position and leans down to hover over him, and Jason loves how it makes him feel small and protected. Todd’s cock slips teasingly into his crack, sliding over his hole, and Jason whines. 

“Fuck me,” he says. “Be good and fuck me.” 

Todd  _ growls _ , and wastes no time shoving back inside. He drives forward hard enough that Jason can feel the ripple of force jiggling his ass and thighs, and their skin smacks loudly as they meet. Jason yelps, ecstatic, as he’s jostled up the bed, and he reaches out one arm to hold onto the headboard, the other scrambling for purchase in the sheets. 

“That’s good, baby, just like that!”

So Todd fucks him just like that; hard, but not too fast. 

Jason blindly reaches out for Todd’s hand on the bed next to him and yanks at it. “H-hold me down.” 

Todd does, his huge hand pressing firm on Jason’s back with enough pressure to make his lungs struggle to fill. His other arm slips under Jason’s body to wrap around his front like a steel bar. “Yeah?” he pants. 

“Yes,” Jason grunts. “Yes,  _ fuck yes _ ,” he repeats, voice cracking each time Todd pushes into him until he’s yelling it,  _ screaming _ it. 

And just when he’s close to coming, Todd pulls out. Jason howls an inarticulate, desperate, pitiful noise. He tries to rub off on the pillows but Todd lifts his hips up and away so his cock touches nothing but empty air. 

This is something else they talked about before; they went over the do's and don’ts, and it was hard for Jason to say out loud but this was one of his do’s, along with being held down. Todd had understood though. Todd understood all of it. He understands, now, that even when Jason flails, he’s enjoying it– he’s  _ loving _ it. If he wasn’t, he would say one little word, and Todd would slip back inside and finish him off. But he doesn’t say that word. He lets himself feel this, feel all of the wild desire and need built up inside, and lets himself go crazy with it. 

Todd leans back and props Jason up higher on his knees so his hips won’t touch the pillows, but keeps one hand pressing his upper body down. That hand slides up into his hair, shoving his face into the sheets and Jason can feel himself drooling like an idiot but he doesn’t want any of this to stop. There’s the sound of the bottle of lube again, and then he feels it dripping onto the top of his crack. Todd smears it down, all the way to his balls, coating his ass and thighs with it, and Jason lets out a high, appreciative moan. 

“Look how wet you are,” Todd says. He slips one fingertip inside and wiggles it around to show much room there is. “So fucking loose. Think how much you could fit inside.” 

Jason groans, full of want. 

“Now?” Todd asks. 

Jason nods, as much as he can while still being pinned down. Shuffling in close, Todd pops the head of his cock just past Jason’s rim, and pulls out. Then he does it again, and again, each time never going further than and inch or two, and Jason cries out a long, continuous wail. 

Then he lifts Jason’s upper body up off the bed and guides him so that he’s kneeling, legs spread wide, back leaning against Todd’s chest, head lolling on Todd’s shoulder. 

“‘S so good,” Jason mumbles breathlessly. 

Running his hands all over Jason’s body, Todd asks, “Ready to finish?” 

“Yeah. ‘M ready.” 

Sliding fully inside his ass, Todd whispers in his ear, “You can feel this good with someone else, Jason. I promise.” 

Jason blinks at the wall. “Okay,” he says, and he’s not entirely sure he believes it, but maybe he can try. 

While one arm goes back across his chest, the other hand wraps firmly around his neck. Jason closes his eyes, leaning his weight backward. He feels like every bad thing in his brain has fallen out of him, leaving a wonderful euphoria behind. 

“Do it,” he croaks, and Todd holds him tight and fucks him until he comes, silent for once, gasping quietly for breath, tears burning in his eyes– but they’re  _ good  _ tears. 

They’re release. 

~

Todd cleans him up gently and tucks him into clean sheets, planting a kiss on his temple.

“Goodbye,” he says softly as Jason drifts off, content. 

~

A few days later, Jason is standing on the sidewalk outside a pet shelter, a leash in his hand and an old German shepherd at his side. 

He pulls out his phone. 

“Hello?” Tim sounds groggy, like the call woke him up. It’s four in the afternoon. 

“Uh, hi. I got a dog,” Jason says, feeling like that one statement makes him vulnerable now. He coughs. “I don’t really know what to do with it… Do you happen to know anything about dogs?”

Tim laughs. “Oh, are you serious? Um no, I don’t.” 

There’s a moment of quiet and Jason, regretting everything, is about to hang up when Tim speaks up again. 

“But I could, like, find out stuff. If you want.”

Jason breathes. “Yeah?” he finally says, looking down at his dog. He bites his lip. “That’d be good. You wanna come over?”

“You pick up some pies from Nino’s and I’m there.” 

The line cuts out and Jason smiles. “Come on,” he says to the dog, who looks up at him with sweet eyes and a wagging tail. “Let’s go home. You can meet Daddy’s… friend.”

**Author's Note:**

> “And maybe I made a mistake yesterday. But yesterday’s me is still me. Today, I am who I am with all of my faults and my mistakes. Tomorrow, I might be a tiny bit wiser and that’ll be me too. These faults and mistakes are what I am, making up the brightest stars in the constellation of my life. I have come to love myself for who I am, for who I was, and for who I hope to become.”  
— Kim Namjoon 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading! I'd really love to hear what you think o_o


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